Nepal’s Gen Z protest: How Fake News Tried to Rewrite a Revolution

Claims that Ravi Laxmi Chitrakar, wife of former Nepali Prime Minister Jhala Nath Khanal, was burned alive in her home—fake. The reports of an angry mob destroying and vandalizing the Pashupatinath Temple—fake. Allegations that protesters were demanding a Hindu nation in Nepal—fake. As Kathmandu and other Nepali cities erupted in unrest last week, the fire of fake news spread just as fiercely across Nepal and into neighboring India and the rest of the world.

Loss and Damage at COP30: Indigenous Leaders Challenge Top-Down Finance Models

As climate-induced disasters continue to devastate the Global South, nations are steadily mounting pressure at the United Nations for wealthier countries to deliver on long-promised climate reparations through the Loss and Damage Fund. For Indigenous peoples, whose territories are often the most ecologically intact yet most damaged by climate change, these negotiations define survival, sovereignty and recognition as rights-holders in global climate governance.

UN Independent Commission Finds That Israeli Forces Have Committed Genocide in Gaza

On September 16, the Israeli military began its ground offensive in Gaza City, accompanied by intensified bombardment of residential areas and a surge in civilian displacement. Concurrently, the United Nations Independent International Commission of Inquiry on the Occupied Palestinian Territory, including East Jerusalem and Israel, issued a report in which it found that Israel is responsible for committing genocide in Gaza, citing deliberate efforts to destroy Palestinian life, carried out with near-total impunity.

‘The Authoritarian Regime Uses Collective Punishment to Discourage Any Challenge to Its Authority’

 
CIVICUS discusses the deaths of Indigenous activists in custody in Tajikistan with Khursand Khurramov, an independent journalist and political analyst.

Struggle For Water Continues Following Israeli Attacks on Lebanon

Just under a year into a fragile ceasefire, 150,000 people in southern Lebanon continue to deal with the potentially lethal aftermath of Israeli bombing, highlighting the devastating long-term effects of conflict.

Better Use of the World’s Expertise in Navigating the Polycrisis

Other articles in this series on clustering conventions that are addressed by the Triple Environmental Crisis of pollution (Stanley-Jones), biodiversity (Schally) and climate change (Azores) I have touched on the idea of clustering not only conventions but the science-policy bodies established separately to serve them. We address the question of the negative consequences of maintaining status quo and identify how “consolidating knowledge” might make a difference.

When Civil Society is Kept Outside, We Should Build a Bigger Room

The recent IPS article, "UNGA’s High-Level Meetings: NGOs Banned Again," served as a stark and painful reminder of a long-standing paradox: the United Nations, an organization founded on the principle of "We the Peoples," often closes its doors to the very communities it was created to serve.

Why the Awaza Declaration Could Rewrite the Future for the World’s Landlocked Nations

The theater of diplomacy can be more revealing than the speeches. Under a scorching Caspian sun in Awaza, two marines lowered their flags with the precision of a ballet. The green silk of Turkmenistan, folded into a neat bundle before the UN’s blue-and-gold standard, fluttered briefly and vanished into waiting hands.

AfDB Commits 11 Billion Dollars To Support Early Warning Systems, Food Security in Rural Africa

As increasingly frequent droughts and devastating floods are affecting agricultural productivity, leaving millions of people food insecure in Africa amid a lack of climate finance, the African Development Bank (AfDB) has committed USD 11 billion to support various climate-resilient and infrastructure projects in rural areas.

The Cruel Deceptions of Peace in Palestine

In a long past due move, the UN General Assembly voted 142-10 to approve a plan called “The New York Declaration” that hopes to revive the long dead Two State Solution for Palestinian Independence.

Closing the US$1.5 trillion Gap: How FDI can Help Achieve SDGs in Asia & the Pacific

Over the past two decades, foreign direct investment (FDI) has been the single largest and most stable source of external development capital in Asia and the Pacific (see Figure).

Inside Africa’s Big Bet on Youth to Feed the Continent and Who’s Actually Getting Funded

Winnie Wambui leans forward on the panel stage, microphone in hand, scanning the room until she spots a raised hand.

Why Collective Healing is Central to Peacebuilding

Wars and oppression leave behind not just rubble and graves. They leave behind invisible wounds, profound trauma carried by survivors. And most often, women carry the largest burden. They are targeted not only because of their gender, but because surviving and leading threaten structures based on patriarchy and domination.

AI Governance: Human Rights in the Balance As Tech Giants and Authoritarians Converge

Algorithms decide who lives and dies in Gaza. AI-powered surveillance tracks journalists in Serbia. Autonomous weapons are paraded through Beijing’s streets in displays of technological might. This isn’t dystopian fiction – it’s today’s reality. As AI reshapes the world, the question of who controls this technology and how it’s governed has become an urgent priority.

NGOs on a Virtual Blacklist at UN High-Level Meetings of World Leaders

When the high-level meeting of over 150 world political leaders takes place September 22-30, thousands of non-governmental organizations (NGOs) and their accredited UN representatives will either be banned from the UN premises or permitted into the building on a strictly restricted basis-- as it happens every year.

Africa Calls for Homegrown Climate Solutions in Just Transition

African climate negotiators and civil society organizations at the second Africa Climate Summit (ACS 2) have called on governments to include sustainable farming approaches and other Africa-led solutions in their revised Nationally Determined Contributions (NDC) and National Adaptation Plans (NAP) ahead of COP 30, as the only way to have their priorities on the global climate negotiation agenda.

UN Warns of Escalating Humanitarian Emergency in Haiti As Armed Gang Violence and Aid Deepen Crisis

In recent months, the humanitarian crisis in Haiti has taken a considerable turn for the worse, with armed gangs continuing to exert dominance over nearly 90 percent of the capital, Port-Au-Prince. Rising violence, the collapse of essential services for millions, and severe cuts to humanitarian funding have left the international community struggling to provide immediate relief and find a sustainable, long-term solution.

The United Nations Turns 80: a Miracle it has Lasted So Long

At eighty, the United Nations is bogged down by structural limitations and political divisions that render it powerless to act decisively – nowhere more clearly than in the Gaza genocide.

Education Cannot Wait Interviews Tom Dannatt, Founder and CEO of Street Child

 
Tom Dannatt is a Founder and CEO of Street Child, an international non-government organization active in over 20 disaster-hit and lowest-income countries – working for a world where all children are ‘safe, in school and learning’. Tom founded Street Child in 2008 with his wife Lucinda and has led the organization since its inception. Street Child leads the civil society constituency within ECW’s governance and, accordingly, Dannatt represents the constituency on the Fund’s High-Level Steering Committee.

Experts Launch a Climate and Health Curriculum for African Negotiators Ahead of COP30

Despite climate change being a health risk multiplier, health is often underrepresented in climate negotiation processes. Experts attribute this to a lack of funding by the African governments and a lack of capacity building among climate negotiators.

Israel, Hamas, the US and Qatar—Unraveling the Mess

Israel’s brazen attack on Hamas’ negotiating team in Qatar while they were deliberating a new ceasefire with Israel raises serious questions not only about the legality of the attack, which violated international laws and norms, and concerns over Qatar’s sovereignty, but also the potential regional and international fallout.